Federal funding pause delays Kandiyohi County Road 55 project
May 31---- In 2023, the
completed the diamond exchange that connects County Road 5 to Highway 23. To complete the next phase of the project, Kandiyohi County Public Works has been planning to construct a bridge in 2025 which would streamline the connection between County Road 55 and County Road 5 and eliminate an at-grade railroad crossing.
The start date of the nearly $8 million project on the southwest edge of Willmar — the final piece in a years-long, multi-phase reconfiguration of the intersection — is uncertain after a pause in federal funding. More than half the project cost would be covered by a federal grant.
The development of southwest Willmar began in 2006 when the Willmar Municipal Airport was moved to a location two miles farther west. This was done to provide more space for the airport and for the industrial development within the city, according to Kandiyohi County Public Works Director Mel Odens.
The old airfield spanned areas that are now home to several of the newest businesses in the Willmar Industrial Park.
Since the airport was moved, 11 other infrastructure projects have been completed in the area, including the Willmar Wye railroad bypass, multiple sewer and wastewater improvements and the relocation of the bridge over Highway 23 from its previous location at County Road 55 to its new location at County Road 5. These projects represented around $200 million worth of investment in southwest Willmar, according to Odens.
The moving of the bridge was done, in part, to make room for ramps in the Highway 23 diamond exchange to be installed for easier access to County Road 5, which in turn reduces the distance trucks need to travel in order to access the industrial park.
Before the ramps, trucks would need to drive to U.S. Highway 71 to enter the city and would then need to drive along roads not meant for vehicles of that size in order to reach the developing area, Odens explained in an interview. This took the trucks past several less-than-ideal locations, he said.
"You have a school here, so the trucks are going by third-graders, we have businesses here, you have an eye clinic, a church, a memory facility. It doesn't coexist very well. So when the vision was coming together, it's like maybe we ought to pull these trucks off of this road," Odens said.
Since the access point to Highway 23 was moved, County Road 55 needed a connection to the highway. To provide this, the county in 2020 constructed a temporary road which passed over the railroad tracks and curved around to connect with County Road 5 plus an extension connecting County Road 55 directly to Highway 23. This was the first phase of the current four-phase project.
Phase two eliminated the southernmost portion of that road where it had intersected with Highway 23. That made way for the new ramps.
This left the connection — still in use today — from County Road 55 to County Road 5 in an awkward state, with trucks needing to take a harsh turn in the process. To remedy this, phase three of the project aims to construct a bridge over the railroad to connect the two county roads.
Public Works' planned project would build a 300-foot spanned bridge over the railroad tracks in the area southwest of Willmar. This bridge would tie into the interchange on Highway 23. The surfacing on the road going north to Highway 40 would be redone.
"We have had to phase that intersection in. I know it is a sense of frustration with the public and the user, but we didn't want to detour traffic and funding sources weren't readily available. We couldn't just close it and do it all. We had to do a project. When our project was done, the state put the ramps on the interchange. Now we are going to come in for phase three and build the bridge up to the interchange," Odens said.
This project is estimated to cost $7.8 million. Of that, $4.8 million in funding came through a discretionary grant, the Railroad Crossing Elimination federal grant. However, due to a pause in federal funding, the project has been placed on hold.
"We have been working for loosely 10 years. When the lower bypass project was being planned, the plan was to put a bridge over the railroad tracks when the Willmar Wye was built. From 2016 on, this has been part of the vision of the county for a western bypass," Odens said in an interview.
Odens found out about the federal funding delays at the end of January, at the start of the year when the project was set to take place.
On Jan. 28, the Trump administration announced a pause on federal grants and loans, including funds for the local project.
"We don't have those kinds of funds available. (If the pause isn't lifted), we would delay the project," Odens said previously.
On May 6, Odens confirmed that the funds are in the process of being made available and the Kandiyohi County Public Works Department will have access to them soon, allowing the project to take place. He offered no updates during the County Board's most recent meeting on May 20.
After the third phase is complete, the final phase that will be conducted by the Minnesota Department of Transportation will begin. The final piece is surface work on Highway 23 starting around 15th Street Southwest and going west past the County Road 5 bridge.
Funding for the County Road 55 project comes from local, state and federal sources. The paused Railroad Crossing Elimination grant is administered by the Federal Railroad Administration, one of 10 agencies within the Department of Transportation.
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